She always murmured blessings on the child as she drank the wine, and no doubt this little ceremony was the beginning of her devotion to the baby of the family.
This devotion was made still greater by what happened one day.
There were unkind and thoughtless people at Greystanes as well as everywhere else. And one summer there came some "new folk" to live in one of the cottages inhabited by Uncle James's farm-labourers. This did not often happen, as he seldom changed his people. These strangers were from some distance, and had never happened to come across the poor half-witted old woman, and there were two or three rough boys in the family who were spoilt and wild, and who thought themselves far above the country people, as they had lived for some time in a small town. And so one day—Oh, dear! I am getting this chapter of mother's story too long. I must begin a new one.
PART III.
Well, one day, as I was saying, the children, who had not seen old Betty for several weeks, were on their way to the village—two miles off—when near the corner of a lane, they heard a great noise. Loud voices and jeering laughter, and a kind of strange shrill shrieking, which made them stare at each other in wonder and almost fear. Nurse was not with them, they were to meet her further down the road, as she had gone on first with a message to a woman who was ill.
"What can it be?" said Maisie.
They hurried on to see, and the mystery was soon explained. There in the midst of a little group of boys, and two or three girls also, I am afraid, stood the poor old idiot. She was convulsed with rage, screaming, shrieking, almost foaming with fury, while first one then another darted forward and gave a pull to her skirts or jacket from behind, and as quickly as she turned, a fresh tormentor would catch at her from the other side, all shouting together at the top of their voices, "Wha is't this time, my Leddy Betty? Thaur, ye have him noo."
They were not hurting her, but it was the insult she felt so keenly, for she was used to respectful treatment. The Simpson boys, the new comers, were in the front of the fray, of course.